Bonjour! I have been in France since the last blog was posted (actually I was in Paris when I posted the last one, so technically I could have added more but I didn’t feel like it then). Right now it is the 25th of March and I am sitting on a night train from Paris to Madrid. When I last wrote, I was headed to the ferry in Rosslare to Cherbourg. Once again, the ferry (Irish Ferries) was very much like a cruise ship and pretty cool. It was overrun by students from France, but I actually had made a friend from Paris who was on the same ship so we talked most of the time. Once we arrived at Cherbourg (part of Normandy) I went exploring throughout the town. Unfortunately, to get to Omaha Beach, the famous D-Day beach, you need a car, which I don’t have. Oh well, next time I’ll just get a car! I did find out that Cherbourg was were the Titanic was made and it is quite famous for its creation of massive ships and other such things. Quite amazing I would say! From there, I went to Paris where I saw so much stuff! The very first day I ended up walking over 14 miles just so I could see all that I could! First thing I went to was the Catacombs, then the Pantheon, Notre Dame, little Italy, and then I decided to purposefully just wander around and not use the map. I ended up going southwest and after about an hour and a half of just walking seeing random things, I found out where I was and walked towards the Eiffel Tower. I actually didn’t go up the tower as it is pricey, and my bucket list includes the Eiffel Tower, but one thing was missing, so I’ll wait til I go back (which I will) and then all will be right. Of course my bucket list does include climbing Everest, seeing the Northern Lights, finding Nessie, trekking through the Himalayas and finding a yeti….you know, the sensible things! I met a couple who were from China on their honeymoon and they wanted me to take their picture in front of the tower, which is in turn how I got my picture that’s up on Facebook. Their camera was much nicer than mine, so I figured they were safe to let take my picture! I took way too many pictures of the tower, but love some of them, and I will have to figure out how to post some on here! I went to the Louvre the following day and spent 8 hours there! Still didn’t get to see it all too! I met up with my new friend from Paris that night, Eric, and he showed me some of the more “local” things. It was really awesome to get to see Paris through the eyes of a local, plus he had loads of information about anything and everything. Pretty much, my brain was on information overload that day and needed some time to just wind down before sleeping. I did run into some problems with the ticket agents in the Paris stations with them not wanting to reserve me seats on my trains for the next few days so I didn’t get to go to Lyon or Geneva. I did get everything resolved later though by talking with someone who was head of the ticket agents and they ensured that I was treated fairly. The person earlier said they were completely full for all trains from Paris to Lyon, which I guarantee you not that many people traveled on all 14 trains for that day just for the trains to Lyon. Oh well, I got to spend more time in Paris, which actually gave me the opportunity to see a few things I had yet to see/didn’t even realize they were in Paris like Arc de Triumph and I got to go to the top of Notre Dame, which was incredible! While in line for that I met some wicked awesome people, Clare and Ali, both from London, who I will be meeting back up with at the end of my travels when I spend my last days of my journey in London. I think one of the most fun parts of this trip is not just seeing all the sights or tasting all the different foods, but its getting to meet incredible people and connect with them and find out about them.
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